Draft tops likeability table

2011-03-24 00:00

Tony Koenderman

Draftfcb, long the champion of likeable advertising, has done it again. Four of the most-liked TV commercials of last year came out of the agency’s creative department: Toyota Auris (Buddy and ChiChi), Toyota Hilux Man Up (Broken Down), Panado (Parrot) and Savanna cider (DJ on fire).

However, the best-liked spot of all wasn’t really a TV commercial but a promotional video flighted on DStv channels to promote itself – and it wasn’t devised by an ad agency but by a production company, Studio Zoo. Just to show it was no fluke, Studio Zoo also produced another of the top 10 (see table).

Another agency behind the most popular ads was MetropolitanRepublic for Wimpy’s “Two Tenners” and (indirectly) for Coca-Cola’s “Snow Globe” – part of the massive Soccer World Cup output of Coke’s dedicated creative boutique, Red Lounge. That short-lived agency was set up under MetropolitanRepublic’s auspices, with talent recruited from a variety of sources. It’s now been closed.

Ogilvy also contributed to the top tenners.

The results come from Millward Brown’s Adtrack, which has been measuring the likeability (widely accepted as a crucial factor in making ads effective) and awareness of all TV commercials on a weekly basis for 25 years.